Sunday, May 5, 2013

Zuckerberg Island

Submitted by Lloyd:

I’d like to take a few moments
to tell you about an experience I had about 20 years ago on a small island just
outside Castlegar, BC. It’s called Zuckerberg Island. When I was about 14 years old
I went to Nelson to stay with my father for a few weeks during the summer. My
older brother was living with him at the time. One evening, my brother and a
few of his friends took me to Zuckerberg Island, but to this day I don’t recall
what the main reason for going was, I can only recall the events that took
place for me when I was there.

It had to be about 6pm when we arrived, because
the sun was just starting to go down. Now, if you're familiar with the island's
layout, there is a rather large suspension bridge, that sits maybe 100- 150 ft.
above ground (not sure how high it actually was) that connects the parking area
to the island itself. If I had to guess, I would say it takes approximately 15
mins to cross it (at the walking speed of a 14 yr. old). The visit to the
island started out quite normal; we crossed the bridge, and found our way to an
open area where there were benches and tables for sitting at. We sat around for
some time socializing and taking in the sights. After a while it started getting
darker and darker. Before long, I had noticed a young girl sitting alone on
one of the benches across the open field. I didn’t think anything of it at first;
she just seemed to be sitting there observing our activities. Me being a 14 yr.
old boy, I was paying extra attention to her as she sat there...

This went on
for about 30 minutes and my curiosity got the better of me. I decided I would try
to talk to her and find out why she was there alone. I glanced away for what
only seemed like a quick moment to inform my brother that I was going over to
talk to the girl on the bench, but when I turned back toward the bench, the
young girl was gone. It was at that time, I discovered that no one else in the
group had noticed anyone sitting in the area we were in. I felt a bit uneasy
about that, but put it aside thinking maybe I was just seeing things. As it
grew darker, it also became colder so we all decided we would head back to the
car. Just as we were leaving the open area I decided to glance back at the
bench to see if the mystery girl had returned and to my surprise she had. I
quickly got my brothers attention and pointed her out, this time he did see
her. As we made our way towards the suspension bridge to cross back to the
parking area I noticed that the young girl had begun to follow us. We tried to
call out to her to see if she wanted to walk with us but got no response in
return, she simply continued to follow us. Just before we reached the bridge we
had noticed that she had quickened her pace and was starting to catch up to us,
still not answering anyone’s attempts to talk to her. We were all a bit scared
at this point and decided to start running towards the bridge. We began
crossing the bridge, my brother in front followed by his friends and lastly,
me being the youngest, I was also apparently the slowest...I was about half way
across the bridge, my brother and his friends already across, when I started to
feel like someone was directly behind me reaching out to me. I was too afraid
to turn around and look, but I could hear my brother yelling for me to run
faster. About three quarters of the way across I decided to look behind me and
saw the same young girl only a few feet behind me. I closed my eyes and ran as
fast as I could to the end of the bridge, when I got there, I again turned around;
only this time there was no one there. The girl had vanished. Since I knew for
sure she hadn’t passed me at the end of the bridge, the only other way to go
was back to the other side of the bridge, but that would've taken at least 4-5
minutes to cross at full running speed. However, there was no one on the bridge or
on the other side. At that point, I was completely scared and wasted no time
getting into the vehicle and leaving. As we were driving away, my curiosity
again got the better of me and I turned towards the bridge one last time. The
young girl was standing on the bridge only a few feet from where I had stopped
to see if she was there. To this day, I still remember the expression on her
face. It was an expression of such sadness I had never seen before, nor have I
ever seen since. About a week later my brother told me he had heard about a
young girl around my age that had committed suicide off the suspension bridge a
few years back. Now, I don’t know if there is any truth to what my brother told
me in regards to the suicide, but I do know what I saw that night.

I have made some inquiries as
to the validity of what I saw that night, but have only got such responses as,
"Zuckerberg Island is known to be haunted" or "there have been
reports of occurrences on the island over the years.

Part of me hopes that in
sending this to you, it may help others
tell their stories as well, and possibly reaffirm for me that we weren’t just
having some weird "afraid of the dark" moment...